Entropy labels are “random” label values included in a header field (e.g., an Internet Protocol (IP) header or a multi-protocol label switching (MPLS) label stack) of a packet to facilitate Equal Cost Multipath (ECMP) based load-balancing (“flow entropy”). Without entropy labels in a network where devices (e.g., label-switching routers (LSRs)) are performing ECMP solely on the basis of the header field, packets with the same forwarding information (e.g., header/label stack) will typically all follow the same path since most ECMP implementations use the forwarding information (e.g., header/label stack) as the input to hash-based load-balancing algorithms. When multiple flows have the same forwarding information this means they cannot be effectively load-balanced. Entropy labels solve this problem by giving the source router the ability to “tag” different flows with different entropy label values, resulting in different headers/label stacks for different flows and better ECMP load-balancing.